Prime Minister Narendra Modi's promotion of the "selfie with daughter" initiative has not cut ice with the women leaders of JDU.
Lesie Singh, the social welfare minister and JDU's female face, convened a news meet on the eve of Modi's visit to the state and accused him of not doing enough for the women of the country. The leaders are far from convinced by Modi's initiatives to promote the girl child.
"The Narendra Modi government is busy promoting things like selfie with daughters, while girls' education and safety should have been the priority. Beti Bachao doesn't mean protecting the BJP's women such as Sushma Swaraj, Smriti Irani, Sadhvi Niranjana (the Fatehpur MP), Vasundhara Raje and Pankaja Munde," Lesie said on Friday.
In June, during his monthly radio talk Mann ki Baat, Modi had termed a Haryana sarpanch's idea urging fathers to click selfies with their daughters and tweet them as a "great" one and sought to use it to push the Prime Minister's Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao scheme.
"I request you all to upload selfie with daughter with hashtag #selfiewithdaughter with a meaningful message and I will retweet those pictures that are the most inspiring... we all are working towards turning this into a public revolution... in this way, we will preserve the dignity, pride of daughters..." Modi had said.
Lesie, however, claimed that recent research studies have found BJP-ruled states had the lowest sex ratio. "In Haryana and Rajasthan, the sex ratio is declining. Maybe in the next census, the figures will be even more depressing. Sex determination, female foeticide and infant girl killing are a trend in these states. Why is the government not sensitive towards these issues?" she said.
The sex ratio in Haryana is 879 females for every 1,000 males, which is below the national average of 940 according to the 2011 census. The sex ratio in Rajasthan is 928 females for each 1,000 males and has shown little growth compared to the 2001 census. (922:1000).
"The female literacy rate is also not impressive in these two states. According to the 2011 census, female literacy rate in Rajasthan and Haryana are 47 and 56 per cent, respectively," Lesie said, tearing into the BJP for failing to protect women and ensure their rights.
She also highlighted the work done by the Nitish Kumar government in the past 10 years for women.
